[epistasis]

I'm curious when this was recorded, but my guess is early 2000s or maybe late 1990s?

With how Apple has avoided ever becoming a monopoly in pretty much any area, and instead tries to just take the top most profitable customers, it really meshes well with this idea of not becoming a monopoly and having the company rot.

Edit: looks like this might be from Triumph of the Nerds, a series released on PBS in 1996. So before Jobs' return to Apple and Apple's turn around.

[bee_rider]

That’s an interesting thought. I always assumed they went for the upscale market because that’s where the profit margin is. But also, it does seem to let them pull in a ton of profit while not ever becoming a monopoly or the dominant player.

I think they are only the majority in tablets, right? And tablets seem to be, oddly enough, a bit stagnant.

[epistasis]

Yes, it's more than simply going for the most profitable customers, it's about avoiding the least profitable customers so that there's still a forcing function on the company to stay on top. And also direct immediate feedback trhough loss of the high profit margin customers, when starting to fail.

Of course, this could be overthinking a plate of beans, maybe Apple just aims for a high price point and high profit margin. But if you did want to take most of the current profits, and most of the future profits, you'd ensure you got enough feedback to not become a monopoly. You'd aim to take only the high profit margin customers and intentionally ignore the lower profit margin customers to let some form of competition continue to push on you.